New to 5200 having issues

[Dopy25]

I just got a 5200 recently. I started it up to make sure everything ran and realized the controllers are bunk. After reading reviews of controllers and finding out they are seriously prone to failure, I opened one of mine up. I cleaned it a little and tried again with no luck. Took it apart and cleaned again but left the cover off. This time I pressed various contacts with a metal object and was able to start pacman. Yay me! 

 

I tried cleaning more and put it back together. The controller still didn't want to work. I read about replacing the flex circuit but didn't want to resort to that yet as I still wasn't sure the rest of it worked. I say this because the controls were still drastically off. I found out about the pokey adjustment and looked into that. I also understand that it can get corroded. I took apart the console and cleaned the pokey pot after marking it's current location. After cleaning, I put it back where it was. I know it's eyeball but figured it was better than nothing. Dried it off and tried again. Now the stupid console freezes before I can even do anything. 

 

I figured it was contacts on the cart. I cleaned. Tried again. This time it lasted longer but still glitched out. See pics.

 

Has anyone seen this before? Any guidance on what I could do to fix it? I was super excited to get my first 5200. I had a 2600 and 7800 already. I really wanted this. I didn't read about it until after and seeing all these issues wish I didn't go for this. I can usually troubleshoot and clean things to get them to work but holy crap this isn't working for me. 

 

I also cleaned up some nasty old solder residue on the parts outside of the RF shield. Are there integral parts under the RF that could cause this kind of glitch and stop controllers from working? Attached images are pacman at boot and a few seconds later. It doesn't do it from the start so I think I still have hope. Any advice is greatly appreciated.

 

 

 

 

Here are a few pics of the board for more information. The RF shield is a real pain in the ass...

 

 

Edited September 5, 2021 by Dopy25

[+Mitch]

What are you cleaning it with and are you allowing it sufficient time to dry?

 

Mitch

[Dopy25]

26 minutes ago, Mitch said:

What are you cleaning it with and are you allowing it sufficient time to dry?

 

Mitch

91% alcohol. Letting it sit for a bit to dry but also have a heat gun to speed up the process. I'm not drowning it either. Just a bit on a trip and drying it off after.

 

Edit: By heat gun I mean a glorified hair dryer. I don't leave it on for long and I hold it back a few inches. 

 

Edit again:

Could my issue have anything to do with this part? It looks quite discolored. I found a replacement for sale on console5

https://console5.com/store/cd4050-cmos-hex-buffer-converters-atari-2600-5200-4050.html

I did not use the pliers to remove it. They just happened to be on the clean spot of my desk when I took the pic. I used a plastic spudger to remove it from the socket.

Edited September 5, 2021 by Dopy25

[Dopy25]

One thing I just tested, the GTIA has 1v on pin 40 at boot and after the glitch starts happening, the voltage increases rather slowly to 2v, then to 3v and stays. (Slowly as I a few seconds between each). I don't know what normal voltage is on that pin so I'm not sure if this is normal. I ordered replacement 4050s, 4052s, and hopefully a 4013 if I can modify my order. I have no idea where to order any of the replacement original Atari proprietary ICs though so I'm hoping it's not those. Fingers crossed. 

 

Well it looks like that's most likely my problem. I zoomed in on all my images and found a crack on the GTIA. Crap. Off to post in the wanted section.

 

By the way, this is from the first images I took, before removing and reseating each IC. I took that picture as a reference point. So this was broken before I ever opened the console. What I did see is that someone else may have been in here first. The coax cable appeared to be repaired, albeit on the end outside of the console, but there were also 2 screws missing from the bottom of the case. So either someone took the screws for another use, or someone else opened this up before me.

Edited September 5, 2021 by Dopy25